April 9, 2025: Budding daffodils! Photo by Jeannine.
This is where I present my daily microfiction stories, mostly based on the past week’s prompts from The Fiction Dealer. By posting my humble tales - the good, bad, silly, and indifferent - I hope to inspire others to allow their creativity to come out and play.
April 12, 2025: Frosty returns! Photo by Jeannine.
Mom always put in a big garden every year. I asked, “Mom, is it really worth all that trouble and effort?”
Mom grinned. “Well, we get fresh veggies and fruit to eat. Not to mention that gardening provides exercise and time to relax.”
I muttered, “But it’s so much work!”
My kids trooped indoors, laden with buckets of raspberries, their faces and hands hopelessly stained. “Grandma, is there enough for a raspberry crisp?”
“Yep,” she assured them, and they all began merrily hopping around the kitchen, cheering. “Now you can’t get a better return on your investment than that,” she chortled.
The best selling author lived in a nursing home now, his mind lost to Alzheimer’s. But today he awoke with his mind remarkably clear, full of a wonderful story. He didn’t know if it was imaginary or real, but he hastened to write it down. An aide came to bring him to breakfast, but he waved her away. He needed to finish his work before the mists of dementia returned.
I’d left long ago, but now I’d made my fortune and was ready to come home. How proud my father would be of my great accomplishments! How pleased my mother would be to see the fine man her boy had grown into!
But when I finally found the place where our house belonged, everything and everyone were gone. Only an old, cracked, blackened granite hearthstone gave testament to where the old homestead once stood. I’d returned home far too late.
One day a farmer found an injured owl in his field. He brought it home with him and nursed it back to health, feeding it on mice until it was strong enough to fly away. The farmer did not realize that this owl was Athena's favorite pet until the next day, when she appeared before him to offer him three wishes in thanks.
The farmer decided to use his first wish to ask the goddess of wisdom to give him all the answers in the world: “I want to know everything!” His mind was instantly flooded by disjointed thoughts: “Yes!” “No!” “Because ice cream has no bones!” “42!” On and on the answers stampeded through his brain, until he felt as though he would go mad!
“Please, Goddess, take away these answers, I can't hear myself think.” And so he'd used his second wish.
The farmer thought long and hard before making his last request. “Wise Goddess, please give me the power to ask all the questions, so I can then search out my own answers.”
“Good choice, former farmer. For now on you will be known as Primus Philosophus, the world's first philosopher. Henceforth you will cultivate minds instead of vegetables.” And so he lived, seeking wisdom for the rest of his days.
The children ran around the tree, shouting boisterously. An old man hobbled out from the churchyard and stuck out his cane, tripping up the leader. The rest quickly stumbled to a halt.
“Hey, mister, what’d you do that for?”
The old man glanced at the tree. “Don't you know the legend of that monkey puzzle tree? The devil is trapped inside, and if you wake him up, he'll give you a monkey's tail."
The oldest boy sneered, “Where'd you hear that fairytale, old man?”
The man turned, using his prehensile tail to pull the boy to his feet. “Experience, lad. Hard experience.”
I had a lot of trouble getting this one right: The first attempts were too grumpy and in the next one, I accidentally forgot the prompt word! I finally ended up with a properly lighthearted Haiku about “honour” in my fourth attempt… Thank you to
And your pictures. I hope you'll be giving us a sort of week-by-week narrative about how everything changes over the year.
We must have a more southerly climate than you because our daffodils have recently finished their flowering. Still, now everything else is coming out and it's lovely.
ah, Orwell. Prescient, no?
I love the Athena fable.
And your pictures. I hope you'll be giving us a sort of week-by-week narrative about how everything changes over the year.
We must have a more southerly climate than you because our daffodils have recently finished their flowering. Still, now everything else is coming out and it's lovely.